Latest King Crimson

Fans of progressive rock had reason to rejoice this past summer when Robert Fripp, the guitarist and bandleader of the legendary progressive rock band King Crimson, dramatically announced he was coming out of retirement and the group was “returning to active service.”

Here's an ode to a piece of gadgetry rarely covered on GuitarWorld.com, something that has brought a whole new world of sounds to guitarists' fingertips: the guitar synthesizer, aka the guitar synth. First of all, exactly what is a guitar synth? To quote Norm Leet, who wrote an authoratative feature on the topic for Roland's UK website, "a guitar synth is a synth module whose input device is a guitar instead of a keyboard."

A few days ago, I caught another very cool show at The Iridium on Broadway and 51st Street here in Manhattan. It was the opening night of a two-night visit by Tony Levin's band, Stick Men, and the Adrian Belew Trio.